Kerson writes:
When conceiving this album, I asked myself what I would be searching for in any musical experience. It was clear there was a sense of duality to my answer – on the one hand, I want to be immersed in an intense, heartfelt soundscape that reflects the multifaceted nature of what it means to be human, and on the other hand, I felt it was equally important to be transported to a different world in the ethereal sense, far away from the realities of day-to-day life.
I wanted this album to reflect the journey from one extreme to the other, as if the solo violin, not unlike a protagonist’s character arc, undergoes a transformation from beginning to end. With this in mind, it felt natural to settle on this unusual pairing of concertos. The Britten lives what seems like a raw and totally exposed experience, and the Bruch provides the kind of comfort and uplift I’d look for in spades. Bruch’s In Memoriam serves as a perfect bridge between the two.
With the onset of the last few years, in which the world has experienced much difficulty and uncertainty due to pandemic, war, and crisis, it soon occurred to me just how personal and relevant this choice of repertoire had been, and how much more determined I became to bring this project to fruition. Recording this album in London in January of 2021 with the Philharmonia Orchestra and Patrick Hahn was a profoundly cathartic moment, and it is in this spirit of catharsis that I offer this album.